Vaccine and Cell Therapy Lab

Several approaches have been taken to enhance immunity against tumors in humans. These strategies target either the adaptive immune responses, i.e T cells and B cells, or enhance the activity of antigen presenting cells (APC) such as dendritic cells (DC). Dr. Sabado is involved in developing new approaches to enhance the activity of DCs in vivo. Although early clinical trials have established the ability of DC immunotherapy to exploit a patient’s own immune system to induce anti-tumor immune responses, clinical success have been limited. Therefore, she is involved in clinical trials testing various adjuvants to generate potent immunostimulatory DCs as well as in combination with other agents that can overcome suppression mediated by the tumor microenvrionment which will translate to clinical success.